Jim Silva of Peabody, Mass., was flying his first mission
over northwest France when anti-aircraft fire hit his P-51
at about 5,000 feet. Smoke filled the cockpit as Silva, then
21, struggled to bail out.

"I finally got out at about 1,000 feet," he recalled
of his World War II experience. "Just another second
or two in a 350 mile-an-hour dive would have been too late."

Silva drifted down and was attempting to bury his parachute
when he realized German soldiers were surrounding him. They
took him to a prisoner-of-war camp in the French port of St.
Nazaire. It was Sept. 19, 1944-three months after D-Day.

By this time, these German forces-some 65,000 men-were cut
off from the main German army, and food was in short supply.
This was especially true for their POWs.

"We got a bowl of thin soup a day and a loaf of coarse
bread to divide," said Silva. "We said the soup was
so thin you could read a newspaper through it."

Wayne Stewart of Wenatchee, Wash., had a similar POW experience.
A 19-year old private, he was on patrol in the same area Oct. 2,
1944, when he and his unit were captured and taken to an island
fortress, Ile de Groix, off the French coast.

"Supplies were low, and we survived on two slices of bread,
two spoons of lard and a cup of thin soup a day," Stewart said.
"It was about 700 calories. I weighed 160 pounds when I was
captured and about 130 when I got out."

Silva and Stewart might have spent the rest of the war in these
circumstances-another six months on skimpy rations with little medical
care-had it not been for the actions of Samford graduate and Board
of Trustees member Gerow Hodges '42.

Allied and German officers
meet to begin historic prisoner exchange arranged by Gerow Hodges
(middle, in dark uniform) during November of 1944.

As senior field director for the American Red Cross, he arranged
two rare prisoner-of-war exchanges in November of 1944 that resulted
in freedom for Silva, Stewart and 147 other Allied POWs.

"Who knows what another six months would have meant?"
asked Silva, who dropped from his normal 160 to 145 pounds during
captivity.

Fifty-seven years after the POW exchange-the only one of its kind
in the war-12 veterans of the swap gathered at Samford in January.
They met Hodges, most for the first time, and shared remembrances
of the exchange for a documentary being put together by an independent
film producer.

Samford hosted Hodges, the former POWs, their family members and
about 200 others at a recognition dinner Jan. 25. As part of the
program, movie newsreels of the exchange were replayed.

"It was very therapeutic to sit in the hotel lobby and
talk to men we hadn't seen since the war," said Stewart.
"I had exchanged mail with David Trachtenberg over the
years, but I hadn't seen him since November of 1944. It was
a great service the school performed."

Trachtenberg, from Lake Worth, Fla., was one of nine members
of Stewart's outfit, K Company of the 301st Regiment, 94th
Infantry, that came to Samford. That company was surprised
by Germans in an ambush. Greatly outnumbered, they fought
for four hours before running out of ammunition. Finally,
they surrendered.

As a gesture saluting their bravery, the Germans allowed them to
bury their dead comrades in a German cemetery.

The veterans came from across the U.S. to meet and share thoughts
on their war experience. In addition to Silva, Stewart and Trachtenberg,
those taking part were George Boyd, Efland, N.C.; Roy Connatser,
Louisville, Tenn.; Harry Glixon, Port Charlotte, Fla.; Morris Shulman,
West Orange, N.Y.; Bernard Rader, Parkland, Fla.; William Reynolds,
El Paso, Texas; Kermit Harden, Urbana, Ill.; George Brady, Bethesda,
Md.; and Harold Thompson, Hawkinsville, Ga. All but Silva, Reynolds
and Thompson were members of Company K.

To a man, they praised Hodges for his efforts and Samford for bringing
the group together.

"I'm certain we would all have died or had our health seriously
impaired had we stayed in prison," said Stewart. "Thanks
to Hodges, we survived."

Hodges was an unlikely participant in the POW exchanges. He was
unfit for military service in WW II because of a football injury
suffered at Samford, but because he had seen so many young men his
age go off to military service, he volunteered for the Red Cross.
He was attached to the 94th Infantry in northwestern France.

Early in November of 1944, Maj. Gen. Harry J. Maloney, commanding
general of the 94th, called Hodges in to discuss getting desperately
needed supplies and medicine to Allied POWs in the Lorient sector
of Brittany.

He told Hodges, "We think that's your job, not ours."

Hodges began making regular trips through the German lines under
a Red Cross flag. After several such trips, he had a better idea.
He suggested to his German contacts that an exchange of prisoners
would be less trouble for everyone. Surprisingly, the Germans agreed.
After getting permission from the European Theater Operations (ETOUSA),
Maloney gave Hodges the go-ahead.

November 17, 1944, dawned gray and cold in the small fishing village
of Etel. At 10 a.m., the exchange began.

"The prisoners were brought to the opposite sides of a river
running through Etel," Hodges recalled. "We exchanged
10 or 12 at a time, going back and forth in small boats. I remember
one young soldier, about 17, kissing the dock when he got on our
side."

Stewart and the other Company K members were included in this group.

The second exchange was arranged for November 29, but only after
Hodges had driven through the German lines and had been transported
blindfolded by car and a two-hour E-boat ride to meet German officers
in St. Nazaire. This exchange-which included Silva, Reynolds and
Thompson-occurred in the French countryside near the village of
Pornic.

Also included in this exchange was Captain Michael R. D. Foot,
who went on to become an esteemed scholar and WW II historian. Foot,
author of several books on the war and co-editor of The Oxford
Companion to the Second World War, found the exchange to be
unique in the war.

Both Stewart and Silva described POW life as one of boredom
and routine, after their capture.

"I was kept in solitary confinement for five days after
my capture," said Silva. "I was interrogated by
a German officer who took out his pistol and said, 'I can
take you out and shoot you anytime I want, and nothing can
stop me.

'"But after a few days, I was sent to join other prisoners
and settled into a routine. We tried to think of ways to escape
and made a couple of abortive attempts, but mostly we played
cards."

As a lieutenant, Silva was the senior American in the St. Nazaire
camp. He decided a few daily calisthenics would be better for the
men than just sitting around all day, and conducted the sessions
with the help of a veteran sergeant.

"They grumbled at first," he recalled, "but then
got over it."

Neither group had much advance warning about the exchange, and
Silva was skeptical that it was the real thing until he marched
his men past the German line and into the American sector.

"The cheering broke out at that point," he said. "Gerow
was very important to us."

Seasons is published quarterly by Samford University, 800
Lakeshore Drive, Birmingham, Alabama 35229, and is distributed free to
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